Book: And Baby Makes More

Book: And Baby Makes More

I am coeditor, with the lovely Chloe Brushwood Rose, of the anthology And Baby Makes More: Known Donors, Queer Parents and Our Unexpected Families, published by Insomniac Press in 2009. Check it out — especially if you or some queers you know are considering making a baby and wondering where to get the goods. Or if you’ve been asked to donate said goods. You can read the introduction and first chapter here. And excerpts from each essay here.

A quirky, funny, and occasionally heartbreaking collection of personal essays, And Baby Makes More offers an intimate and unprecedented look at the relative risks and unexpected rewards of queer, do-it-yourself baby-making, and the ways in which families are re-made in the process.

What happens when would-be dyke moms or gay dads ask a friend or acquaintance to donate sperm or an egg, or to act as a surrogate? When a “single dyke” is vehemently not a “single mom” and a “sperm donor” not a “donor dad”? When a trans mom-to-be donates her (carefully banked) sperm to her friends? What’s at stake for non-biological parents when a donor is also part of the picture? What happens if things get ugly? What happens when we take risks we never imagined – and, in so doing, create and name new ways of being family, for better or for worse?

While in many cases these are stories of finding (or not finding) the “right” biological stuff for baby-making, they are also stories that powerfully call on us to reconceive of family beyond biology.

The contributors—donors, biological and non-bio queer parents, and their children—offer provocative, nuanced insights into what it means to be or use a known donor and how queer families are being reconceived to include new roles, new rules, and, kinship ties that transcend biology. This is the go-to book for potential LGBTQ parents, their donors, family members, and friends.

What people are saying...

And Baby Makes More is a thoughtful, funny, and poignant volume about the variety of ways we define families today. [As co-editor Chloe Brushwood] Rose explains, “Our family is an ongoing experiment in making words and experiences line up, in finding new words, in learning how to talk.” And Baby Makes More offers other queer families a beginning grammar to continue the conversation.

— Dana Rudolph, founder and publisher of Mombian, in Bay Windows, New England's largest LGBT newspaper

The stories in this collection are loud and inspiring examples of courage, creativity and love in queer parenting. I knew these people existed somewhere — the queers who make their dreams of babies and families come true, in the queerest of ways. ... this book succeeds in the most urgent of its aims: creating a space for these stories to be heard.

— The Dominion

Bottom line: Go buy this book, along with Who’s Your Daddy?. Both are the kind of rich explorations of LGBTQ parenting we need more of today.

— Dana Rudolph, on Mombian

... diverse, poignant, and sometimes very funny ... As this is a Canadian anthology, where same-sex marriages have been legal for several years, ... the editors take for granted the legitimacy of same-sex bonds and get on with the business of making babies and childrearing. The results are surprising, enlightening, and mandatory reading for any lesbians or gay men thinking of embarking on adventures in the wild world of parenthood.

— The Gay & Lesbian Review

Susan was able to understand complex material and explain technical concepts clearly, concisely and logically.